Later
by Yggi
Summary: KOTOR. FF. Based on the rarely noticed Juhani romance subplot from Knights of the Old Republic. Juhani and Revan share a moment after the Rakatan Temple.


Juhani tried to focus on the hum of the starship engines. Their steady hum was just about the only harmonious thing for her senses to grasp at. Her sharp ears brought her the sounds of her crewmates running back and forth in final preperations, making last minute adjustments to armor and weapons. She could just barely make out Zaalbar's voice exchanging words with Mission, though she couldn´t make out the details. Her nostrils still detected the strange, pungent aroma that had infiltrated the ship on the Rakatan homeworld, mixed with the sickly sweet smell of gizka feces.

Even all these distractions were better than what her Jedi senses brought her, though. She had been trying to filter out the sense of doom and hopelessness, the result of Bastila's Battle Meditation, as well as the faint but still noticeable voices of those dead, dying, or fearful of death. She had met with some success, but that still left the people she had traveled with for the past few months. Their physical proximity, as well as her long association with them, left their emotions all too audible.

Juhani sighed. No . . . best to be honest with herself. The real reason for her inner tension and inability to meditate wasn't due to the empathic messages she had damn well been trained to filter, or the upcoming battle where she would have to truly test her mettle as a Jedi. The problem, as always, lay within herself.

Or perhaps more accurately, herself and the anxious yet still presence she felt through all the chaos.

The Cathar opened her eyes. She hadn't been any closer to reaching a meditative state than when she started out anyway.

She looked into her lap. One habit she had picked up from Quatra was to let her hands rest palm-up when meditating, and the scratches her own claws had inflicted on them stood as sharp reminders of the scene a few minutes earlier.

Not since striking Quatra so badly during their last meeting (or so she had thought), had she felt so powerless in the grasp of a deep and terrible fear. She felt ashamed, like she had been terribly selfish, but the thing that had really bothered her hadn't been the very obvious fact of the fall of Bastila, her fellow Jedi and sister in the Force. It had been the ripple of uncertainty she had felt course through Tana, at Bastila's seductive words. The supposed lies and manipulations of the Jedi Council, Tana's "rightful claim" to the title of Dark Lord. Unlimited power and a galaxy at her feet . . . and Bastila at her side.

Juhani had forgotten to breathe, locked her fists into tight balls, and felt the dread rise within her. It had in no small part been aided by yet another source of guilt, just as she had been overcoming her previous ones. The knowledge that she had never summoned the courage to truly speak her feelings to Tana . . . to Revan. Her saviour, idol, comrade, friend . . . and more?

Would the admittance have made some difference in the human's final decision? Would she fall back into her old ways, due to a slight imalance in the scales?

Jolee had stood next to her, composed on the surface, but Juhani had sensed feelings churning within him.

"Be strong now girl." he had muttered to her.

Juhani finally had time to reflect on just what he had meant. She had told herself at the time that he had meant for her to have faith, to believe that the Light Side of the Force would win the battle in Tana's heart.

But no. He had been telling her to summon the strength to strike both women down should Sana make the wrong choice.

Could she have done it? It would have been her duty. As a Jedi, as a servant of the Light, and as a defender of the Republic.

She thought back on her morbid conversation with Tana at the beginning of their quest: When Juhani had pleaded with her to be the one to end her life, should the Cathar succumb to her inner struggles and turn against everything she believed in. She had wanted it to be someone she trusted and respected.

Yes, Juhani realised. She could have turned her lightsaber against Tana and Bastila. The realisation was a confusing mix of gratification and horror.

Just the thought was so very, very painful.

She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. It hadn't come to that. There had been no need for Juhani to break her heart as a final testament to her devotion to the Light and her duties as a Jedi. Tana had won the battle and turned Bastila's tempting offer down.

Perhaps the brief moment of terror had been a blessing in disguise, though. After all, it had pushed Juhani into laying the cards on the table. Into hesitantly and fearfully exposing her heart and speaking directly from it. It had prompted another short moment of terror, as the still shaken Tana had grasped with her own feelings, before saying exactly what Juhani so desperately wanted to hear.

"I feel the same way."

Even with all that was going on; their friend in service to the Dark Lord and the fate of the galaxy being decided, they had allowed themselves a moment of tenderness on top of the ancient temple. For a fleeting moment there had just been the two of them, the gentle breeze, and the sun warming their faces.

All thoughts of war, tragedy, despair, uncertainty, self-doubt and the Jedi teachings had left her for the briefest of moments.

Then reality had sent them racing back down the stairs and out to the beach, and from then on it had all been frantic action and planning.

And now waiting. Waiting to enter the very heart of the Sith.

Carth needed no help in steering the Ebon Hawk, which left the rest of them trying to prepare and occupy their time however they could.

With Juhani's equipment amounting to her lightsaber and utility belt, her own preperations had been dreadfully short, and left her trying to calm herself before battle as she had been taught.

No luck.

Normally she would have beaten herself up for it. Cursed her own weakness and lack of discipline. But the quest for the Star Forge, most notably the encounter with the creature Xor and the escape from the Leviathan, had somewhat quelled the usually ever-present voice of insecurity. And given the events that had just transpired, she supposed emotional chaos was only to be expected.

She shook her head slowly and stood up.

To be expected, perhaps, but that didn't make it acceptable.

She opened the door to the alcove she had made her home and stepped out into the common area. She walked past the two droids, standing at attention as only droids could, and Zaalbar, trying to fit as many grenades on his bandoleer as possible while an anxious Mission looked on. She passed the sick bay, inside which she could sense the old semi-Jedi gathering strength before the upcoming battle. And she stopped before the closed doors leading into the cargo hold.

It had over the weeks become the place where crewmembers went to speak in private or to seek solitude, with Juhani's exception who spent most of her time alone in the alcove anyway.. Now, clearly, it served that purpose once more.

Juhani could sense the only person she had truly allowed herself to love since her parents inside it, just as anxious as the Cathar herself.

_No_. Juhani corrected herself. _More so. We may both be anxious, but she has crushing guilt to deal with on top of that._

She steadied her palms on either side of the door and leaned forward, letting her head drop as she fought the butterflies in her stomach.

All the battles she had fought and trials she had been through . . . heck, after recently fighting her way through a temple infested with Dark Jedi . . . and she still had to summon courage in order to open a door.

_Are our feelings for each other a good thing? _she thought. _Will anything, assuming we survive this, be possible?_

She took a deep, calming breath, and dove in before her fears sent her back to the alcove.

The door slip open with a slight hiss, and closed the same way behind her.

The cargo hold had become a bit of a mess over time. Various things the crew had collected, looted or bought over the course of their journeys and then discarded as they either broke or something better came along lay scattered about. Mission and Zaalbar were the worst, frequently sifting through discarded weapons and tools and tinkering with them.

Tana sat with her back up against a box containing disassembled blasters, arms crossed in what seemed like an attempt to hug some comfort into herself.

Aside from the pained cleam in her eyes, the woman looked outwardly tranquil, but Juhani's Jedi senses cut far deeper than her physical ones. Ever since the Leviathan Tana had become steadily more like Juhani: A dust devil of wild emotions and conflicts, pulled this way and that by hope and despair, self-loathing and confidence. It was so very different from the figure Juhani had idolised ever since Revan's arrival on Taris and, to a lesser extent, after their encounter in the sacred grove. But somehow it made the Cather care for her all the more.

They held each other's gaze silently for a few moments.

"Is it supposed to be this hard? This . . .complicated and screwy?" Tana finally said.

Juhani hesitated, weighing between the possible meanings of the question, before deciding it had probably been multi-layered.

"Perhaps it is." she answered. "Perhaps . . . all this wouldn't be as meaningful . . . if it wasn't difficult."

Tana nodded slowly, her flat expression not changing.

"Yeah. It's damn difficult . . . being a saviour and a monster." She glanced in the direction of the cockpit; the direction of the Star Forge. "Marching into the heart of darkness to fight two friends turned enemies. And, uh . . ."

Tana trailed off and looked at the floor.

Juhani stood still for a few breaths before crossing the distance and sitting next to her. She slid her arm around the human's shoulders, who turned to look at her.

"You are afraid." Juhani said.

"More than I ever remember being." Tana admitted bluntly. "Even with all we've been through, everything we've done, this is so . . . huge. I've tried to meditate, but the Force isn't telling me anything. I don't know what's going to happen"

"No, me neither," Juhani said, lightly rubbing Tana's shoulder in what she hoped was a comforting manner. Her lack of experience at showing affection made her nervous.

Not that they had a relationship yet, Juhani reminded herself. Just the possibility of one.

"With what we are heading into," Tana continued, "I . . . it's so uncertain we'll even make it through this that I can't even begin to imagine what will happen afterwards."

That pretty much summed up Juhani's feelings. The aftermath of this last, great battle had more possibilities and paths than the Cathar could easily count. Could Bastila be saved? Would the Jedi survive? Or would the decimation of their numbers and the galaxy's loss of trust in them doom the Order? Would the Republic still be able to hold together after the cost and losses of the two wars? Would there, at last, truly be peace once this was over with? Would people judge her love for her merits and the actions of her new identity? Or would she be hated . . . even hunted?

So many possibilities. So many things that could go wrong and so many that could go right. Juhani felt ashamed about it, but while it was a minor concern on the larger scale, the question which itched her the most was . . .

"The Council. How do you think they will feel about . . . us?" the Cathar asked.

Tana leaned her head against Juhani's shoulder, and shrugged.

"Well they won't be happy about it, we can assume that much. As for wether they'll take any action . . . anything could happen I suppose. They have certainly tread some unconventional paths for my sake. Perhaps they'll tolerate one more deviation. Or . . ."

_Or perhaps not_, hung unsaid in the air between them.

There was another little period of silence, and Juhani used it to gather her thoughts.

"The Council are the heads of the Jedi. I owe them my allegiance." Juhani said, looking at the ceiling. "And I have sworn my life to the Order, an oath I have every intention of honoring. Being a Jedi . . . it is my dream. My life. It is how I have come to define myself." She turned her golden eyes to meet Tana's brown ones. "But . . . I want you too." she said from the bottom of her heart.

Tana didn't say anything. Merely snuck her hand across Juhani's back and placed it on her hip. The other one reached up slowly, carefully stroked her cheek.

It felt strange. Ever since her mother had died the only affectionate physical contact Juhani had received had been the occasional platonic gesture from Quatra.

Strange, but wonderful. Juhani understood why the Jedi forbade love. The turmoil it could bring could be very dangerous. But at the moment, looking into Tana's loving eyes, she didn't care.

"_Approaching the Sith lines_!" came Carth's voice through the intercom. "_Everyone get ready! Canderous, to the gun turret, Tana to the cockpit_!"

The two women held each other's gaze for a moment longer, gathering their resolve together.

Juhani felt Tana tense to rise, but thought back on that terrifying moment on top of the temple. On things left unsaid or undone.

She put her hand against the back of Tana's head, and leaned in. Tana was surprised for a moment, but joined in, and their lips met in a slow, gentle kiss. It was a moment of bliss, in which nothing existed except except the two of them.

The Cathar felt her powerful passions rise, but rather than the usual anger or self-loathing, this time she was overcome with a powerful need to kiss deeper. To truly express the depth of her feelings in a physical way. To lay this woman down on the floor and make her her own.

But she knew this wasn't the time.

"Later." Tana whispered as their lips parted, knowing exactly what was on her mind.

"Yes." Juhani whispered back. "We WILL make it through this. And then our day will come."

"I love you, Juhani."

"I love you too, Tana."

"_Tana! Get over here_!" came Carth's voice again, even more insistently.

"Time to be Jedi." Tana said in her more normal, commander's voice.

Juhani nodded, and the two of them stood up. Tana ran for the cockpit.

Junani stood in the cargo hold, and reflected how her inner tensions seemed to have died away, replaced by determination and hope.

_Later _. . .


End file.
